Most present day safes are designed to operate without external connections. As a result, in order to store electronic data in such a safe, the data must first be put onto a data storage device, the safe must be opened, the data storage device must be placed into the safe, and then the safe can be locked again. While such actions may be acceptable when storing paper documents or other tangible valuables, these actions are cumbersome at best when trying to protect electronic data and a user may not try to protect their electronic data due to the inconvenience involved.
Computer systems are designed to take advantage of the flexibility and ease of adding to, modifying, and/or deleting electronic data. Therefore, while someone might wish to protect their electronic data by placing it within a safe, with many present day safes, they are limited to storing a placeholder version of the data from time to time, because it is not practical to repeatedly open and close the safe to file away a new copy of the electronic data or to gain access to a storage device stored in the safe.
In order to help alleviate this situation, some safes have been designed with pass-through ports or cables to allow data and power to be supplied to the interior of the safe. This type of safe allows an external hard drive to be placed into the safe, connected to the pass-through port, and locked within the safe. An external computer can then connect to the exterior side of the pass-through port and freely access the hard drive stored therein without having to open and close the safe's door. In such a situation, data backups to the storage device protected within the safe are much more likely because they can be automated by the external computer, and no repetitive steps are needed by the user. Unfortunately, the convenience which appears to make this type of safe appealing can be a major security risk. Anyone with access to the outside of such a safe can connect many different types of computers to the exterior side of the pass-through port and have free access to browse, delete, copy, modify, or steal the data therein. The situation is analogous to having a large peek hole into a safe full of papers, whereby just for looking down into the peek hole, the contents of the safe may be revealed or stolen.
Moreover, existing safes also provide for transmission of data from an external data source located outside a safe to a data storage device located inside the safe using an infrared communications link. However, the use of an infrared communications link has a number of disadvantages when used to transmit data to a storage device located inside a safe. For example, the use of an infrared communications link to transfer data is extremely time consuming and therefore inconvenient for a user that is transferring a relatively large amount of data to the device located inside the safe. In addition, the use of an infrared communications link requires a direct line of sight between the external data source and the safe which includes the data storage device. Every time a user would like to transfer data to the data storage device inside the safe, the safe will need to be placed in a position that can receive infrared communications from the external data source. Exposing the safe may be inconvenient given that safe are typically placed in a concealed location that is not easily accessible, and contrary to the general desire to keep a safe in a hidden location.
Therefore, it would be advantageous to have a safe which can protect electronic data stored within the safe from unauthorized access while still enabling convenient data access for authorized users. It would also be advantageous to provide a system that allows device data to be conveniently and quickly transferred from an external data source to a device located inside a safe without exposing the safe's concealed location.